I've taken up Martyn's suggestion and allowed the format and codec list
to extend right to the bottom of the screen. Other changes include:
* No nesting of static boxes (saves width)
* Shorter Choice boxes (using SetSizeHints())
* Short options (Tick-box options and language 3-letter-code) on one
line (saves height)
* Less padding around options (was 5px, now 3px, saves height)
* Change in "Not all formats..." string (saves width because we are
using a proportional font!)
This brings the dialog down from 777x573 on Windows XP to 678 x 492, a
33% area saving.
I hope/expect this will be good enough for Ubuntu too. I have
experimented with adding a scroller which could save us a lot more
space, but with all the downsides of having a scroller. That's in the
code but commented out.
If Gale agrees I would like to close this P2 issue and create a new P4
which captures some of the remaining detail issues about this dialog. A
P4 something like:
P4: FFMPEG Export Options Dialog Tweaking
"Various improvements can be made to this dialog to improve appearance
and reduce size."
-----
In detail (the checklist could link to this e-mail thread for this detail):
* When localised the long warning string could cause the dialog to get
significantly wider. One solution is to have it on three lines, and
only over the format/codec boxes. That way if it is extended when
localised it could steal space from them without increasing width. We'd
also need a localistaion hint about line breaks so that translators knew
what to do.
* I'd like all the prompt strings to consistently have ':' at the end.
* Some options don't have tool tips, e.g. VBL. VBL should in any case
be written out in full as 'Variable Block Length' again (there is room now).
* Using large fonts this dialog could still be too big. I've some
further options for reducing space: Replace the top row by a menu,
replace the show-all-formats and show-all-codecs buttons by an -ALL-
option actually in the lists. Then there are possibilities using
scrollers tabs and sub dialogs if we are really space constrained.
----
--James.

Thread view

I've taken up Martyn's suggestion and allowed the format and codec list
to extend right to the bottom of the screen. Other changes include:
* No nesting of static boxes (saves width)
* Shorter Choice boxes (using SetSizeHints())
* Short options (Tick-box options and language 3-letter-code) on one
line (saves height)
* Less padding around options (was 5px, now 3px, saves height)
* Change in "Not all formats..." string (saves width because we are
using a proportional font!)
This brings the dialog down from 777x573 on Windows XP to 678 x 492, a
33% area saving.
I hope/expect this will be good enough for Ubuntu too. I have
experimented with adding a scroller which could save us a lot more
space, but with all the downsides of having a scroller. That's in the
code but commented out.
If Gale agrees I would like to close this P2 issue and create a new P4
which captures some of the remaining detail issues about this dialog. A
P4 something like:
P4: FFMPEG Export Options Dialog Tweaking
"Various improvements can be made to this dialog to improve appearance
and reduce size."
-----
In detail (the checklist could link to this e-mail thread for this detail):
* When localised the long warning string could cause the dialog to get
significantly wider. One solution is to have it on three lines, and
only over the format/codec boxes. That way if it is extended when
localised it could steal space from them without increasing width. We'd
also need a localistaion hint about line breaks so that translators knew
what to do.
* I'd like all the prompt strings to consistently have ':' at the end.
* Some options don't have tool tips, e.g. VBL. VBL should in any case
be written out in full as 'Variable Block Length' again (there is room now).
* Using large fonts this dialog could still be too big. I've some
further options for reducing space: Replace the top row by a menu,
replace the show-all-formats and show-all-codecs buttons by an -ALL-
option actually in the lists. Then there are possibilities using
scrollers tabs and sub dialogs if we are really space constrained.
----
--James.

I've taken up Martyn's suggestion and allowed the format and codec list
to extend right to the bottom of the screen. Other changes include:
* No nesting of static boxes (saves width)
* Shorter Choice boxes (using SetSizeHints())
* Short options (Tick-box options and language 3-letter-code) on one
line (saves height)
* Less padding around options (was 5px, now 3px, saves height)
* Change in "Not all formats..." string (saves width because we are
using a proportional font!)
This brings the dialog down from 777x573 on Windows XP to 678 x 492, a
33% area saving.
I hope/expect this will be good enough for Ubuntu too. I have
experimented with adding a scroller which could save us a lot more
space, but with all the downsides of having a scroller. That's in the
code but commented out.
If Gale agrees I would like to close this P2 issue and create a new P4
which captures some of the remaining detail issues about this dialog. A
P4 something like:
P4: FFMPEG Export Options Dialog Tweaking
"Various improvements can be made to this dialog to improve appearance
and reduce size."
-----
In detail (the checklist could link to this e-mail thread for this detail):
* When localised the long warning string could cause the dialog to get
significantly wider. One solution is to have it on three lines, and
only over the format/codec boxes. That way if it is extended when
localised it could steal space from them without increasing width. We'd
also need a localistaion hint about line breaks so that translators knew
what to do.
* I'd like all the prompt strings to consistently have ':' at the end.
* Some options don't have tool tips, e.g. VBL. VBL should in any case
be written out in full as 'Variable Block Length' again (there is room now).
* Using large fonts this dialog could still be too big. I've some
further options for reducing space: Replace the top row by a menu,
replace the show-all-formats and show-all-codecs buttons by an -ALL-
option actually in the lists. Then there are possibilities using
scrollers tabs and sub dialogs if we are really space constrained.
----
--James.